102 On the trail of vanishing birds 



only thing that could possibly save us. He dove straight for the 

 river, still dimly discernible beneath us, and leveled off less than 

 100 feet above its tumbling cataracts. Then, using the white water 

 of falls and rapids as a guide, he jockeyed the plane along, his eyes 

 nearly bugging out of his head with the strain of watching the 

 water below, the steep walls close on either side and the ever- 

 present danger of an invisible, sheer flank of rock dead ahead. 



Never did that little craft seem to have such speed! In close 

 quarters like that her 110 miles per hour gave us the sensation 

 of riding an unguided missile up a blind alley. It was a night- 

 mare! Ahead we could see absolutely nothing, and the only way 

 Bob steered her around the abrupt, wholly unpredictable turns in 

 the canyon was by watching the trend of the stream below us and 

 exercising a rare and admirable judgment. The squall didn't 

 slacken until we were nearly through the course of the Bell, then 

 it cleared enough to see us safely over the descending Rat. But it 

 was rough going all the way and we didn't relax until we came 

 out into the clear warm air of the upper Mackenzie delta. Bob 

 sat back with an audible sigh, and when I looked at him I saw the 

 beads of sweat that covered his face. 



That was but the start of our second summer of search. There 

 were other areas to be looked at and our hopes were still high. 

 The North is a big country, and we weren't licked yet. 



